What We've Learned About Heroin Since Philip Seymour Hoffman OD'd

What's driving this epidemic of overdoses? Could it be the same people just busted by the feds?

The FBI, in conjunction with local Italian police, arrested 24 members of the 'Ndrangheta, the Gambino, and Bonnano crime families in one of the largest drug busts in recent memory. Accused of trafficking cocaine and heroin from South America to the U.S. the 'Ndrangheta are new players in the American drug game. These new players are using new ways to bring new heroin – potent heroin… deadlier heroin.

The bust is not the only proof that the 'Ndrangheta are new players in the game. The uptick in heroin overdoses is a glaring example that the game has changed. This uptick can be attributed to heroin laced with deadly additives, heroin with increased potency, and the simple fact that more people are shooting up lately. New sources and distribution methods for the drug provide a surefire sign that someone new is in town running things. In the past few weeks since Philip Seymour Hoffman died, we are coming to grips with an epidemic that stretches from the Long Island subrubs to Pittsburgh. But what's driving this epidemic of overdoses? Could it be the same people just busted by the feds?

"This strikes me as new sources," Scott H. Decker Professor of Criminology and Criminal Justice at Arizona State University said, "Regular heroin users who buy from their regular source, know they're getting a product in a narrow range of purity that they can tolerate. When purity spikes up dramatically, then even the most seasoned, regular user is in trouble. What this spike in ER cases that have been reported and sort of sensational news surrounding the Seymour Hoffman death suggest to me is a new and more potent source of heroin. Knowing from what I read in the newspaper, it doesn't appear as if he had used for a while. The real concern would be spikes in potency."

According to the FBI's press release, the 'Ndrangheta are accused of managing a drug trafficking network that is responsible for shipping cocaine and heroin from Guyana to Italy and then working with the Gambino Crime Family to move the product from Italy to the US by way of New York. They became Italy's most powerful crime syndicate since 2008 when roughly 80 members of the rival Cosa Nostra were arrested as part of a similar operation between the US and Italy. Since then, they have worked with the Gambinos as well as various cartels to develop a drug trafficking network affiliation that supplies a large part of the US and most of Latin America. The 'Ndrangheta-influenced affiliation supplies the Eastern U.S. while the Mexican cartels supply the West with homegrown tar, a purer brand than the brand that heads out East. It should not be a surprise that the Italian crime syndicates are entering the game.

"Heroin is as valuable a commodity as you can smuggle," Decker said. "On a per-gram basis, [smuggling heroin] is more valuable than smuggling currency. We shouldn't be surprised that groups that have long been involved in lucrative forms of smuggling and trafficking illicit goods are involved in them now." Decker co-authored Drug Smugglers on Drug Smuggling, which features interviews with drug traffickers convicted for carrying hundreds of pounds of product. Enough product to be the maximum offense for drug trafficking on a federal level.

The 'Ndrangheta do not run a network. There is no network in South America but rather a loose system of affiliations. It makes the heroin source nebulous even if the charts shown by the police and media suggest otherwise. They avoid directly transporting the drugs and successfully smuggle it past corrupted port officials. Per the release, the corrupted official worked in the Southern Italian city of Giola Tauro. His price: €200,000. Light—especially because the product being brought in is worth more than his price.

"If you're in a business where the profit margins are so great and the amount of profit is so high," Decker said. "The difference between greasing the palm of someone with $500 and $5,000 or $50,000 is not that substantial. We're talking about sums of money so large, it begins to lose its meaning. Not to the people who are being paid off, but to the people who are making the profit."

The game had to change for the drug traffickers to stay one step ahead of the law. It will change again, now with some figures facing trial, but the heroin is still going to be dangerously pure while the transportation methods change. Meanwhile, the bust today may lead to the market fragmenting.

"When there's an arrest, that's good news for people who want in on the market," Decker said. "It's bad news for the people who control the market, but good news for those who want to get in."

No, the network that got Phillip Seymour Hoffman his heroin has not disintegrated. The members of a loosely connected affiliation that supplied the Eastern U.S. with the potent heroin have been arrested, and their arrests should not provide the easiest way for us to move on from his death or the deaths of dozens of young adults. The arrests are an illustration—an illustration that law enforcement has barely begun to catch up to a game that has left them in dust.

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